Waking up to a text message from a friend letting me on a little secret—one of my favorite bands is playing a free concert in just a matter of hours? I was psyched to say the least. On top of the Maroon 5 concert, there was a Celebrity Beach Bowl to kickoff the Saturday before the Super bowl.

We arrived at Victory Park just minutes before the Beach Bowl began; we paid our $15 to see a plethora of celebrities playing football, not to mention see Maroon 5. All of the activities were free. It almost seemed to be too good to be true. It was. We stood in a line for thirty minutes before finding they weren’t going to let any more people inside. Bummer. Big time.

So, we decided to head to the “W” Hotel to sit down and enjoy a drink. We walked in hoping to score a nice spot at the bar—that wasn’t happening either. The Living Room was packed with tourists donning their favorite team’s colors. Apparently everyone heard that the “W” was the place to be. We weren’t pleased, so we walked towards the door. A man dressed in a suit roped the entrance off and stood in front. We slowly backed away from the door and headed back to the bar, suddenly feeling special. You can’t just walk in here now? You have to be special, right? We felt like stars. We walked back in only to realize the scenery hadn’t changed. We walked out.

As we headed towards the car, my friend tapped me on the shoulder and pointed over towards a blonde girl near the entrance of the “W”, bouncing up and down and squealing, preparing her camera and pointing it towards a dirtied white Suburban. Ok, there’s gotta be someone important in there. We decided to stick around.

Mark Salling exited the car. Or Puck from Glee, as you may know him. I found myself getting very star struck and looking as stupid as the girl who was bouncing up and down. Then, Chace Crawford got out of the suburban behind Salling’s car. Cue the sudden flow of celebrities. We were in heaven.

Spotted: Jesse Metcalfe (pool boy from Desperate Housewives) with his girlfriend. She wasn’t too happy about all of the girls swarming him for photos. Better get used to it, girlfriend!

Next up: Guy Fieri. You may know him from the Food Network in Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. Or maybe you’ve been watching his new show NBC’s Minute to Win It. Despite all the glamorous and attractive young television stars that were flowing into the hotel, Fieri got the loudest cheers. (I’ll be quite honest—I was one of the cheerers). One lady even yelled “Guy, come back! We’re hungry!”

I spotted Colt McCoy, and being a fellow Austinite and also a fellow Lakehills Church goer, I walked up to him as he was signing little kids’ footballs, I decided to go for it. I tapped him on his shoulder and a meek “Colt?” came out of my mouth. What was I doing? “Can I get a photo with you?” He said “yes” but his father apologized and said they had to be going. Yes, I was one of those. I went there.

A slew of TV stars jump into a Suburban. (PHOTO BY NATALIE BLANKENSHIP/ SMU DAILY MUSTANG)

Moral of the story: you might just run into celebrities in Dallas around Super bowl time if you are in the right place at the right time. Not necessarily if you stop at every “celeb packed” restaurant and bar. Breathe in, breathe out. I’m still trying to get over it.